 Dear CHCOs, Deputy CHCOs, Human Resources Directors, and Small Agency Human Resource Council,
On May 29, 2025, in response to the President's direction in Executive Order 14170 titled, "Reforming the Federal Hiring Process and Restoring Merit to Government Service," the Domestic Policy Council and the U.S. Office of Personnel Management issued a memorandum titled, "Merit Hiring Plan."
In section A of the Merit Hiring Plan – Ending All Racial Discrimination in Federal Hiring, Recruiting, Retention and Promotion, agencies are asked to implement the following requirements:
- Do not use statistics on race, sex, ethnicity or national origin, or the broader concept of “underrepresentation” of certain groups, in any hiring, recruiting, retention or promotion decisions, or in the design or implementation of any technical or alternative assessments.
- Cease disseminating information regarding the composition of the agency’s workforce based on race, sex, color, religion, or national origin.
The purpose of this note is to clarify the requirements above and how workforce data and Applicant Flow Data (AFD) will continue to be collected and utilized. Agencies will continue to collect and report this information to the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) to support annual and quarterly data reports that agencies are statutorily required to post publicly such as Management Directive-715, and annual Federal Equal Opportunity Recruitment Program (FEORP) reporting. OPM will continue collecting the demographic data on USAJOBS but restrict its provision to agencies unless there is a justified use case. The workforce and AFD is also critical for investigative and litigation needs. Workforce data is considered a necessary part of a fully developed Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) report of investigations in EEO cases. In litigation, this data can also be a key part of the agency’s defense or an indication of a problem.
In addition, agencies are still required to utilize the SF-181, Ethnicity and Race Identification, to collect this information from employees during on-boarding. However, this data and the AFD shall not be used in workforce planning, recruitment efforts, or hiring decisions. These data sets will be used solely to meet the statutory reporting requirements identified above.
OPM Office of Workforce Policy and Innovation
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